Monday, December 15, 2014

The Trial of a Time Lord Parts 5-8 (aka Mindwarp)

"I'm fairly sure that's not Cromer..."
Four episodes (of a total of 14) (Part Five, Part Six, Part Seven, Part Eight)
First broadcast Oct 4 to 25 1986
Average audience for serial: 4.88m

REGULAR CAST

Colin Baker (The Doctor) Born Jun 8 1943 Click here for Colin Baker's entry on Arc of Infinity

Nicola Bryant (Peri Brown) Born Oct 11 1960 Click here for Nicola Bryant's entry on Planet of Fire

Lynda Bellingham (The Inquisitor) May 31 1948 to Oct 19 2014 (colon cancer) Click here for Lynda Bellingham's entry on The Trial of a Time Lord Parts 1-4

Michael Jayston (The Valeyard) Oct 29 1935 to Feb 5 2024 Click here for Michael Jayston's entry on The Trial of a Time Lord Parts 1-4

GUEST CAST

Brian Blessed (King Yrcanos) Born Oct 9 1936
Career highlights
Hearty Brian's debut was in Last Day in Dreamland (1959), after which he had roles in The Valiant (1962), Ghost Squad (1963), The Christmas Tree (1966), Cold Comfort Farm (1968), The Last Valley (1971), The Trojan Women (1971), Henry VIII and His Six Wives (1972), Hadleigh (1973), Arthur of the Britons (1972-73), Boy Dominic (1974), Churchill's People (1974), I, Claudius (1976), The Day After Tomorrow (1976), Survivors (1977), Blake's 7 (1978), The Aphrodite Inheritance (1979), Flash Gordon (1980), The Little World of Don Camillo (1981), High Road to China (1983), The Black Adder (1983), Return to Treasure Island (1986), William Tell (1987), My Family and Other Animals (1987), War and Remembrance (1988), The Castle of Adventure (1990), Waiting for Godot (1991), Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (1991), Much Ado About Nothing (1993), Johnny and the Dead (1995), Kidnapped (1995), Hamlet (1996), The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling (1997), Star Wars: The Phantom Menace (1999), The Mumbo Jumbo (2000), Alexander (2004), Back in Business (2007), Kika and Bob (2008), The Wrong Door (2008), Family Guy (2008), The Royal (2008), Little Princess (2010-11), Henry Hugglemonster (2013-15), Sooty (2013), Decline of an Empire (2014), Toast of London (2015), The Lodge (2017), Robin Hood: The Rebellion (2018) and Dear Mr Burton (2020). Brian also had regular roles as Porthos in The Three Musketeers and The Further Adventures of the Three Musketeers (1966-67) and PC "Fancy" Smith in over 110 episodes of Z Cars (1962-65), and also provided the voice of the Nekross King in Wizards vs Aliens (2012-13).
Awards
2016: Officer of the order of the British Empire (OBE) for services to the arts and charity
Facts
Brian was part of the original London cast of musical Cats in 1981. At the age of 14, Brian attended the Second World Peace Congress in Sheffield (1950), where he met Pablo Picasso and sang I Still Suits Me with Paul Robeson. In 1954, aged 18, he suffered a nervous breakdown. In 2015, Brian collapsed on stage during a performance of King Lear, but managed to complete the performance after being attended to by a doctor from the audience. He later withdrew from the production, and was fitted with a heart pacemaker. He attempted to climb Mount Everest several times. As an avid adventurer, he also climbed Aconcagua in Argentina and Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, and is the oldest person to have reached both the geographical North Pole and the magnetic North Pole. Brian also trekked the jungles of Venezuela, during which he survived a plane crash. Brian has also completed training to be a cosmonaut, with a hope that one day he will be able to visit the International Space Station. He is married to Hildegarde Neil, perhaps best known to cult TV fans as Madame Midnight in Ace of Wands. Brian's distinctive booming voice can be heard intoning "Gordon's alive!" in the 1980 Queen single Flash, and he also features on Pythia's single Army of the Damned (2009) reading Siegfried Sassoon's war poem Suicide in the Trenches. Brian's voice is also a commentary option on the TomTom sat-nav system. Among Brian's many other claims to fame is that he once hospitalised Twelfth Doctor Peter Capaldi with an accidental punch while filming Tom Jones in 1997, and was asked to be the Second Doctor in 1966 but was turned down when he asked if he could make the character "Oriental". He was originally cast as Odin in the 2015 story The Girl Who Died, but had to drop out due to illness. Here he is, on Twitter!
This is Your Life: Brian was the subject of Thames TV's This is Your Life on April 4th, 1984, surprised by host Eamonn Andrews at London's Barbican Centre.

Thomas Branch (The Lukoser)
Thomas's only other credits are Needle (1990), Birds of a Feather (1991) and True Crimes (1992).

Richard Henry (Mentor) Died 2012
Career highlights
Richard made his debut in The Breaking of Colonel Keyser (1972), then Full House (1972), Oil Strike North (1975), Second Verdict (1976), Danger UXB (1979), Juliet Bravo (1983), The Pickwick Papers (1985), Rockcliffe's Babies (1987), The Bill (1988), Without a Clue (1988), Love Street (1994) and London's Burning (2000).

Trevor Laird (Frax) Born Jul 11 1957
Doctor Who credits
Played: Frax in The Trial of a Time Lord Parts 5-8 (1986)
Played: Clive Jones in Smith and Jones, The Sound of Drums/ Last of the Time Lords (2007)
Career highlights
Trevor's debut came in The Vanishing Army (1978), followed by roles in Quadrophenia (1979), The Long Good Friday (1980), Maybury (1981), Babylon (1981), Walter (1982), Struggle (1983-84), The Flying Devils (1985), The New Statesman (1987), The Lenny Henry Show (1988), Slipstream (1989), Bernard and the Genie (1991), Secrets and Lies (1996), Casualty (1999), William and Mary (2003), The Last Detective (2004), Peep Show (2004), The Eagle (2005), Waking the Dead (2009), Thorne (2010), Holby City (2014), Toast of London (2014), Death in Paradise (2015), No Offence (2017), To Be Someone (2020), Small Axe (2020) and Doctors (2003/2021).
Facts
He is one of the founder members of the Black Theatre Cooperative (now the Nitro Music Theatre).

Alibe Parsons (Matrona Kani) Born Dec 21 1945
Career highlights
American-born Alibe debuted in Treasure Island (1972), then made her name playing Sarah Gant in Gangsters (1976-78), followed by roles in Space: 1999 (1977), The Bitch (1979), The Sender (1982), Bergerac (1983), The Brief (1984), Lovejoy (1986), Biggles (1986), Aliens (1986), Dogfood Dan and the Carmarthen Cowboy (1988), Laura and Disorder (1989), Spatz (1991), Full Stretch (1993), Coronation Street (1993), Melissa (1997), Soul Patrol (2000), Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) (2001), Waking the Dead (2004), The Crouches (2005), Inside the Twin Towers (2006), Incendiary (2008), Casualty (1990/94/2008/11) and Catastrophe (2019).

Christopher Ryan (Kiv) Born Jan 25 1950
Doctor Who credits
Played: Kiv in The Trial of a Time Lord (1986)
Played: General Staal in The Sontaran Stratagem/ The Poison Sky (2008)
Played: Commander Stark in The Pandorica Opens (2010)
Career highlights
5ft Christopher debuted in Target (1978), then appeared in Angels (1979), Fox (1980), The Olympian Way (1981), Inside Out (1985), Happy Families (1985), Santa Claus: The Movie (1985), The New Statesman (1992), Dirty Weekend (1993), Mr Bean (1994), Health and Efficiency (1995), Melissa (1997), My Family (2001/03), Saxondale (2007), The Life and Times of Vivienne Vyle (2007), City Slacker (2012), It's Kevin (2013) and Tracey Breaks the News (2018). He will be best recognised as Mike TheCoolPerson in sitcom The Young Ones (1982-84), as well as Tony Driscoll in Only Fools and Horses (1989) and Green Green Grass (2005-06/09), Dave Hedgehog in Bottom (1991-95) and Marshall in Absolutely Fabulous (1992-2012 and the 2016 film). Christopher reprised the role of Kiv for the 2019 spin-off production Sil and the Devil Seeds of Arodor.
Facts
Christopher appears, along with the rest of The Young Ones, in the video for Cliff Richard's 1986 Comic Relief single Living Doll.

Patrick Ryecart (Crozier) Born May 9 1952
Career highlights
Patrick made his earliest appearance in The Goodies (1975), then took roles in The Cedar Tree (1976-77), A Bridge Too Far (1977), My Son, My Son (1979), Silver Dream Racer (1981), The Talisman (1980-81), Dick Turpin (1981), The Professionals (1982), Jenny's War (1985), Casanova (1987), The Bretts (1988), Minder (1989), Goldeneye (1989), A Perfect Hero (1991), Prisoner of Honor (1991), The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles (1992), The Mixer (1992), Heart of Darkness (1993), Lovejoy (1994), Coming Home (1998), Nancherrow (1999), Parting Shots (1999), Holby City (2000-01), Doctors and Nurses (2004), The Lavender List (2006), The King's Speech (2010), The Escape Artist (2013), Poldark (2015-16) and The Contract (2016). He also played David Woodford in The Many Wives of Patrick (1976-78), Sir Kenneth in The Talisman (1980-81), Hugo Latimer in Trainer (1991-92), Captain Hilary Duff in The High Life (1994-95) and the Duke of Norfolk in The Crown (2016-19).
Facts
In 1977, Patrick married actress Marsha Fitzalan, a daughter of the late 17th Duke and dowager Duchess of Norfolk, in Westminster Cathedral. They divorced in 1995. Marsha is best known for playing Sarah B'Stard in The New Statesman.

Nabil Shaban (Sil) Born Feb 12 1953
Doctor Who credits
Played: Sil in Vengeance on Varos (1985), The Trial of a Time Lord (1986)
Career highlights
Born in Jordan, Nabil's acting career began playing Ben Gunn in the 1982 TV movie Walter, after which he took roles in Raspberry Ripple (1986), Iranian Nights (1989), City of Joy (1992), Wittgenstein (1993), Skallagrigg (1994), Slave of Dreams (1995), Children of Men (2006), Trouble Sleeping (2008) and Morticia (2009). He also reprised the role of Sil in the spin-off production Sil and the Devil Seeds of Arodor (2019).
Facts
Nabil, who was born with the brittle bone disease osteogenesis imperfecta, co-founded the Graeae Theatre Company for artists with physical and sensory disabilities in 1980. He was sent to the UK as a child for treatment for his disease and as a result grew up in numerous hospitals and residential homes, with little contact with his family. Long-time Doctor Who fan Nabil sent a letter to the production team in 1974 saying he could become the new Master, and again in 1980 suggesting he could be the new Doctor!

Gordon Warnecke (Tuza) Born Aug 24 1962
Career highlights
Gordon made his debut, and quite a name for himself, as one of the leads in the film My Beautiful Laundrette (1985), then appeared in Young Toscanini (1988), Birds of a Feather (1989), Only Fools and Horses (1990), The Pleasure Principle (1992), A Fatal Inversion (1992), Virtual Murder (1992), Dreamchild (1994), Brookside (1995), Exitz (2007), Looking for You (2010), Puppy Love (2014), Holby City (2017) and London Unplugged (2018). He had a recurring role as Hanif Kurtha in Boon (1986).

CREW

Philip Martin (writer) Jul 3 1938 to Dec 13 2020
Doctor Who credits
Wrote: Vengeance on Varos (1985), The Trial of a Time Lord Parts 5-8 (1986)
Career highlights
Philip's television writing career stems back to 1970 when he began penning scripts for Z Cars, after which he also worked on New Scotland Yard (1972), Gangsters (1975/78), Shoestring (1979), Star Cops (1987), Tandoori Nights (1987), Virtual Murder (1992), The Good Guys (1993), Hetty Wainthropp Investigates (1997-98), Doctors (2007) and Sil and the Devil Seeds of Arodor (2019).
Facts
Philip's unused script for Season 23, before it became The Trial of a Time Lord, was Mission to Magnus featuring Sil and the Ice Warriors, which he novelised for Target in 1990 and was adapted into an audio adventure by Big Finish in 2009. Philip also wrote a Doctor Who 'make your own adventure' book in 1986 called Invasion of the Ormazoids. Philip's writing techniques on Gangsters (which he occasionally acted on as various minor characters) were featured on the Open University study list at one point.
In 2014 Toby Hadoke released his Who's Round interview with Philip here.

Ron Jones (director) Aug 6 1945 to Jul 9 1993
Doctor Who credits
Directed: Black Orchid (1982), Time-Flight (1982), Arc of Infinity (1983), Frontios (1984), Vengeance on Varos (1985), The Trial of a Time Lord (1986)
Career highlights
Starting out as a BBC Radio studio manager in the 1960s, Ron worked for a time as a researcher and writer for the children's show Blue Peter, before acting as an assistant floor manager and production manager on series such as Bergerac and Secret Army. Ron's few other directing credits include Juliet Bravo (1985), the German soap Lindenstraße (1987-88) and the TV movie Burg Wutzenstein (1988). In the 1970s Ron worked as a researcher and writer on the children's show Blue Peter. Ron's partner was Gordon Elsbury, who directed shows such as Are You Being Served?, Top of the Pops and Spitting Image (he was also production assistant on the 1982 Eurovision Song Contest).

John Nathan-Turner (producer) Aug 12 1947 to May 1 2002 (liver failure) Click here for John Nathan-Turner's entry on The Leisure Hive

Eric Saward (script editor) Born Dec 9 1944 Click here for Eric Saward's entry on on Castrovalva

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